Taiji, Japan � For the first time ever, graphic feature-length footage of the annual slaughter of some 2,500 dolphins in Taiji, Wakayama Prefecture, has been captured during a unique yearlong covert operation.

The secret filming by members of the U.S. conservation group Oceanic Preservation Society (OPS) � equipped with state-of-the-art technology and financed to the tune of $5 million by Netscape founder Jim Clark � is being turned into a major documentary feature film destined for worldwide release this summer (although distribution in Japan is at present not certain).

The story of how this film of the barbaric killing and subsequent butchering of dolphins was made � together with the resulting sale of their meat that massively exceeds Japanese and international limits for mercury content � is told here, exclusively, for the first time anywhere in print.